


Lemon Boy

by FangirlftShipper



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Character Death, Friendship, Ghosts (maybe), Kid Fic, M/M, Plotholes, Wholesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-14
Updated: 2018-05-14
Packaged: 2019-05-06 20:26:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14655555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FangirlftShipper/pseuds/FangirlftShipper
Summary: Ryan finds an unlikely friend in his backyard.(Title is from a Cavetown song)





	Lemon Boy

**Author's Note:**

> Hey!
> 
> Another little unsolved fic. This was something i had unfinished in my files for a while but i thought for the sake of finishing it i'd upload it and see if that motivates me to fix it a little bit and make more chapters off of this.
> 
> This is rushed and written with a weird structure but oh well, what's new?
> 
> Sorry for the plotholes, hopefully you'll understand better if the second chapter ever comes.
> 
> Disclaimer: This work is complete fiction, i respect both of the boys (Whom i love!)  
> Buzzfeed, don't sue me.

It was dawn, the sky was a soft peach color and Ryan was bored.

His parent’s weren’t coming home until later that night, his friends were playing soccer in the park down the street and he was here, stuck in his house with nothing to do.

Adrian, his next door neighbor and designated ‘caretaker’ was downstairs, playing videogames and eating pizza, which was pretty much everything he did when he came down to his house to keep an eye on him. Ryan didn’t really like him for obvious reasons, he never wanted to take him to the park, he never shared his food, and to be honest, he was kind of an asshole.

But then again, Ryan wasn’t supposed to say that word.

He sighed, throwing himself on the bed and staring at the little sports decals on his walls, chewing his lip and thinking about something that would get him out of his misery induced by boredom.

Maybe he could go out, if not to the park then to the backyard.

He grabbed his soccer ball and tied the first pair of shoes he could put on, a dirty pair of Adidas that he had worn to school yesterday.

He ran down the stairs, grabbing a Popsicle out of the freezer before opening the glass door that led to the backyard.

“If you sneak out to the park I’ll kill you, kid! Your parents pay me way too little to deal with a missing child.”

Ryan rolled his eyes and slid the door to close it again, he could easily jump the fence and play with his friends for a while without Adrian noticing, but he was never much of a rule breaker anyways.

He kicked the ball mindlessly, running around the grass and feeling cold drops of Popsicle running down his hand and staining his white and red striped t-shirt.

He lay down on the grass at some point, breathing heavily and watching the sky above him, turning redder by the minute.

He felt cold all of a sudden, he should’ve put on a jacket before going out but he was too busy thinking about how much he hated Adrian and how bored he was to notice the weather.

He moved to a seating position and yelped almost immediately.

“Who are you?”

The boy in front of him didn’t answer.

His heartbeat slowed down after a while, and he moved closer to the kid that was unexplainably sitting in his backyard.

“How did you get here?”

Silence again.

He stared straight at the boy, he didn’t look familiar so he probably didn’t go to his school, although he did look the same age as himself.

Ryan frowned, the boy didn’t talk, nor was he moving. He was just there, blinking and staring at the rest of Ryan’s Popsicle that was nearly falling down from the stick.

Ryan looked down to the treat, then back to the boy.

“Do you want it?” He stretched his hand, smiling invitingly.

The kid nodded, taking it hesitantly and taking a bite of the little piece of ice that was dangling from the bottom of the stick.

“It’s lemon and I prefer cherry anyways, so you can have it.”

He watched as the boy licked the stick and the liquid that had dripped into his hand.

“My name is Ryan.” He said after the Popsicle was gone. “I live here.”

“Shane.” Said the kid, voice quiet and polite, unlike Ryan’s excited high pitched tone.

“What’s that?” Asked Ryan, pointing at the yellow box attached to Shane’s jeans.

Shane looked at it, as if he was unaware about its existence. He looked unaware of everything, though.

“It’s my cassette player.”

“Oh! My dad has one of those, he and my mom where listening to their old music the other day and dad pulled it out of the garage and he was telling me, _Ryan, why do you want an Ipod if you can have my old cassette player! I betcha’ none of your friends have one of these bad boys._ And then my mom laughed and said _Honey, that old thing doesn’t even work anymore_ , and I said that in IPod’s you can also play games and talk to your friends and that Brent’s mom had bought him one and it was blue but I wanted a red one because my favorite color is red.”

Shane looked confused, and he just kept playing with the buttons on his plaid shirt.

“So my Dad got me one and gave it to me for my ninth birthday last year but I broke it last month when I was riding my bike.”

Shane didn’t say anything, it was starting to get colder and darker outside.

“Why are you here?”

Shane shrugged. “I was lonely.”

“Where do you live? Where’s your mom?”

“I don’t know.”

Ryan huffed, standing up.

“Well if you’re not going to talk then you should go, my parents are coming home in a couple of hours and Adrian would kill me if he found out you’re here.”

He crossed his arms across his chest, watching as Shane processed what he had said.

“Okay.”

He frowned, ‘okay?’ was that everything he was going to say? What an ass- no, he wasn’t supposed to use that word.

Ryan opened the door to his house, and when he looked back into the backyard, Shane was gone.

* * *

 

He saw Shane again a few days later, sitting cross legged in the grass, same spot as the first time.

“Hey!” Shane slowly dragged his gaze until he made eye-contact with Ryan. “You’re back.”

He had been wondering if he would see Lemon boy (as he had started calling him, because of the Popsicle) again, he was curious to see what was up with this mysterious kid.

“You look sad.” He noted, the first time he kind of looked… empty. Now his eyes were softer and his gaze was sadder. “Do you want a popsicle?”

That seemed to get his attention, he nodded and got up to walk slowly to where Ryan was standing.

“Stay here, I’ll go get some.”

When Ryan got back, Cherry and Lemon popsicles on hand, he sat down next to Shane on the wooden steps and unwrapped his frozen treat.

“So, how old are you?” He asked curiously, wiping his mouth with his forearm.

“Ten.”

“Me too! That’s cool.”

Shane agreed, nodding his head.

“Why are you so quiet all the time?”

“Talking makes me tired.”

Ryan frowned.

“Okay then, that’s weird.”

Ryan swayed in his seat, thinking of more things to say to his new friend.

“I like your shoes, red is my favorite color.”

“My favorite is yellow.”

“Why are you wearing the same thing as the other day?”

Shane finished his Popsicle and then shrugged.

“Don’t know.”

“You are very weird, do you know that? But I like you.”

Shane toyed with the wooden stick.

“Do you want to play soccer?” He proposed.

Shane shook his head.

“What about basketball? I bet my mom would let me go to the park.”

But Shane shook his head again.

“I don’t like sports.”

“What?” Ryan sighed. “Well, what about videogames?”

Shane shook his head.

“Well… do you want to ride with me on my bike?”

Shane looked at him, as if considering the idea.

“Come on, it’ll be fun!”

He grabbed Shane’s hand, cold in comparison to his own warm one.

He grabbed his helmet and got onto his old red bike, maybe Shane would like to see the neighborhood, that would surely make him feel better.

“You’ll have to hold onto my shoulders, come on!”

Shane tentatively put his hands on Ryan’s shoulders, his grip tightening as the boy got faster.

“Hold on tight, Lemon boy!” Ryan screamed, as they descended the little hill.

Ryan heard a quiet giggle turn into a full laugh, and he smiled proudly. He made Shane laugh. And it felt good.

* * *

 

Weeks passed without seeing Shane, summer came around and Ryan started to worry that Shane had gotten lost, or moved, or got sick, something of the sort.

But eventually, Shane showed up.

He looked odd that day, odder than normal. He had a scratch on his left cheek and his hair was dirty, Ryan could see sticks and leaves sticking out of it. His glasses were broken and he was still wearing the same clothes.

He didn’t answer any of his questions, so Ryan gave him a Lemon Popsicle and sat next to him until the sky got dark.

The next time he saw him he was clean again, Ryan didn’t ask questions and they gazed at the clouds, finding figures in them and listening to music in Ryan’s dads Walkman.

“I asked him if I could have it, I thought maybe it would make you feel better. I know you’re sad most of the time.”

Shane didn’t say anything, but he smiled when Ryan turned it on and that, in Ryan’s eyes, was a success.

Sometimes he looked normal, like a quiet kid who had old-fashioned taste and was very quiet.

On other occasions, he looked truly rattled and miserable.

Ryan wondered, biting his lip to stop himself from asking more questions that would go unanswered.

“It was my birthday yesterday.”

Shane looked at him.

“I was thinking about inviting you but I know you don’t like other kids.”

Ryan looked back at the sky, used to silence by this point.

“For you.”

Shane held his yellow cassette player in his hand, passing it on to Ryan.

“I thought it didn’t work?”

Shane shrugged, Ryan smiled.

“Thank you.”

The cassette player (A cheap one apparently, his father told him) didn’t actually work, but Ryan kept it, along with a plain cassette that was inside it, labeled “Happy Birthday, baby boy.” Written in a curvy script.

“Who wrote it?” He asked Shane one day, it wasn’t a good one. He could tell by the way Shane’s eyes looked.

“My mom.”

“Was it a present?”

Shane nodded.

Ryan slowly put pieces together every time Shane told him something about his life.

“I miss her.”

“Your mom?”

“Yes.

“Why aren’t you with her?”

“I don’t know.”

* * *

 

“He spends so much time on the backyard these days.” Ryan’s mom said, looking out of the window, watching as his son stared at the sky.

“Yeah, and listening to music. I don’t know what got into him.”

His parent’s saw only one boy.

* * *

 

When winter came around, Shane only got worse.

Ryan was used to him being quiet, it didn’t bother him like it had done in the start since now he could tell that it really took a toll on the boy. A lot of things did, actually. He didn’t have much energy.

He knew something was up with his friend, now more than ever. He could barely take a few steps on some days, he looked paler than usual and now he didn’t even smile even when Ryan tried really hard to make him laugh.

Since it was cold his mom had stopped buying the popsicles, which only made the situation worse.

“I think I’m gonna leave soon.” Said Shane one day, after almost a week of pure silence.

“Leave?”

“Disappear.”

Ryan nodded, swallowing the knot on his throat and looking at his feet, he had put together the pieces long ago but it wasn’t something he could simply accept.

“How can I help you?”

“Give the cassette back to my mom. Please.”

“Where does she live?”

“It’s… on the player, it’s engraved on the player.”

Ryan ran, he knew there wasn’t any time left.

* * *

 

After hours of asking for directions, Ryan finally parked his bike in front of a light-orange house and knocked on the door.

It was only when a woman opened the door that he realized he had no idea what he was meant to say.

“How can I help you young man?” She asked, and Ryan could recognize those sad eyes anywhere.

“I’m… I’m a friend of Shane’s.”

The woman’s expression changed completely, hit with an unexpected feeling.

“Come in then, you look exhausted.”

Ryan followed her into the house, sitting on a couch while she went to the kitchen to get him a drink.

His eyes wandered over the wallpaper until the pictures got his attention.

Shane was in most of them, holding a puppy, laughing, happy. Genuinely happy.

“Lemonade?”

He smiled, accepting the glass.

“So, you knew Shane?”

Ryan nodded, fidgeting nervously.

“Yeah he’s… he was one of my best friends, really.”

The woman smiled, confused but curious as to know where this kid had come from.

“I know you wouldn’t believe me if I told you exactly how I met him or when… I don’t even understand it. But he thought you should have this.”

Ryan pulled the cassette player out of his backpack and handed it to her.

“Oh dear…” Tears formed in her eyes. “I- I gave him this for his-“

“Tenth birthday, I know. He told me you chose songs that reminded you of him.”

She wiped her eyes, staring at him.

“But how? You’re… you’re so young and the accident was years ago I don’t understand.”

Ryan shrugged. He didn’t understand either.

* * *

 

He went back home before dark, hoping that Shane was still there, waiting for him in his backyard.

He ran inside and went to open the back door, ignoring his mother’s questions about his whereabouts.

“Shane?”

There were tears in his eyes.

“Shane I know about the forest, I know about your accident! I know what happened please tell me you’re still here.”

It was almost funny that he was met by silence.

“Please.” He sobbed. “One last time? Let me say goodbye, please.”

He stuck his hands onto the dirt as if that would make Shane come back, grass tickling his wrists.

His mother screamed for him to get back in the house and eventually he did, crying for someone that wasn’t there anymore.

* * *

 

“Why buzzfeed unsolved, though?” Brent asked. “What made you this interested in ghosts?”

“Just tell me if you’re doing it or not.”

“I’m in I guess, but I don’t really believe in the paranormal or whatever, y’know?”

Ryan laughed.

“That’s fine, I’ll prove you wrong one day though.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this to get this AU and headcanons out of my head so, i'd love to hear your theories/headcanons/questions or whatever you feel the need to say as long as it's not mean. 
> 
> Thank you for reading and don't forget to request something on my tumblr if you'd like :)


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